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Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Artificial Climate Change

Listening to CBC Radio World Report this morning, they had a report about scientists looking for a new phrase to replace "global warming" and "climate change" - unfortunately, I couldn't find the 7 am transcript at the site.

The report discussed how the terms "global warming" and "climate change" invite debate in and of themselves, as opposed to highlighting what is meant by them. The report suggests, and I agree with it, that opponents to the science are focused heavily on pointing out how the phrases used to describe these issues are meaningless as a means to make the underlying problem meaningless.

For the term "global warming", scientists note there are places on earth that are indeed warmer, but some that are getting colder and some that are remaining stable. Therefore, opponents indicate that global warming is inadequate a term, so global warming is not an issue.

For the term "climate change", climates change - it's a fact of nature. Therefore, this climate change issue is simply a fact of nature. Since the phrase climate change is meaningless, the underlying problem is meaningless.

I think it's poor form to simply argue against the terminology as a means to deny reality, but some people do get a kick out of it.

I suggest that we tack on the adjective artificial to the existing phrase "climate change". It denotes that the climate change we're currently experiencing is deemed unnatural - that the observations do not coincide with a natural climate change process. I'd go to the Government of Canada's Climate Change website for info on that, but for some reason, I can't find it. It was right there about 9 months ago ...

5 comments:

Jeff
said...

I doubt they'll make that change. Adding 'artificial' just makes it sound like what it's critics have been saying all along: That it is not happening, and that it's just a fairy tale dreamt up by activists looking for money and trying to stick it to the corportations.

Perhaps "imposed climate change" captures the intent of the term? If someone gets sick as a result of a medical intervention it's called an "iatrogenic" illness (ie: something WE did caused the patient to get sick). I don't know if that term applies to the world of climatology as well as it does to medicine.